MOH and I met at Japonais last night after work to have some saketinis. We love the easy location from our homes, their saketinis and edamame make a great combo for happy hour, and we usually like the music. However, last night there were a few things “off.” There is a waiter who has been working there for about 6 months now, and he really gets on our nerves. He is constantly bugging us to order more, then asks us to close out when his shift is done, and then disappears when we need our credit cards back. MM can’t stand him because he once got snippy with us about bringing our drinks over to the window tables after ordering them at the bar.

Another thing that was odd last night was some new manager who was trying to be funny with us, but was simply annoying. He joked with us about blowing out our candle too often and tried to talk us into another round, but when MOH said “we’ll take another round if at least one is on the house” to which he quickly replied that he couldn’t and nearly fell over the ottomons as he scurried away. Please.

Also, the music tends to blow out an ear drum every time a more upbeat song comes on. They need to learn to monitor the volume better or simply leave it a little lower so that it doesn’t stop everyone’s conversation every 15 minutes.

We love Japonais, but they need to go back to their lowkey and cool happy hour vibe or we’ll find another place to make our standard. It will be a sad day when we have to begin to ask where we would like to meet after work.